There is 1 second left in the Super Bowl. You are the place kicker for the team who is trailing by a point. Your coach calls timeout and calls you over to the huddle. He wants you to kick the game winning field goal. It is do-or-die. If you kick the ball through the uprights and your team has won the most desired trophy in all of football and is “Going to Disneyworld!” However, if you miss this field goal, you will just have to wait until next year. So, how do you feel? Your heart is probably racing, your breathing has picked up, you probably feel butterflies in your stomach, and you may even begin to doubt yourself. That easy little field goal just got a lot harder. This is what the area of sports psychology explores, the effects that one’s mind has on their athletic performance.
How many people actually could control their minds and bodies in order to kick that game winning field goal? Not many. This is where sports psychology comes into play. The goal of sports psychology is to train the athlete to control their mind and the effects that their mind has on their bodies in order to compete at their highest potential. If this is the case however, why is sports psychology still so rare for many sports and athletes? In the article from Behavior Modification, “How does Sport Psychology Actually Improve Athletic Performance? A Framework to Facilitate Athletes’ and Coaches’ Understanding,” the author, Chris Gee, explains that misunderstandings between sports psychologist advocates and the coaches and athletes has caused the field to be underutilized. This misunderstanding is often a result of the lack of tangible evidence in the field of sports psychology. In Gee’s article, he attempts to undermine to lack of understanding illustrating fully the flaws in the common misconceptions towards sports psychology and explaining the benefits that sports psychology can have for all athletes.
Gee begins his article by asking a question. He quotes another researcher: “ If so many athletes need psychological support and are aware that they have this need, why don’t they seek treatment more often?”. Gee answers this question by outlining many common misconceptions about sports psychologists. He first explains that many people think that sports psychologists are like psychiatrists and that athletes will have to go lay on a couch and open up their deepest thoughts to the therapists. It portrays a sentiment of “having a problem” and is a major reason why many athletes do not spend as much time with sports psychologists as they could. This is obviously not true. Sports psychologists typically go into the field with the athletes they are helping and attempts to train the athlete to cope with possible anxieties. Lastly he explains that many coaches and athletes are uncertain of the services that are proposed by the psychologists. The fact that there is no physical evidence makes convincing athletes and coaches of the results extremely difficult. This is why there is much less interaction between athletes and psychologists than there perhaps should be (Gee).
After explaining the common misconceptions of sports psychology and why many people don’t participate in its practice, Gee explains that sports psychology is extremely beneficial to most every athlete who becomes involved. He does this first by defining two terms that are crucial in understanding the essence of sports psychology. The first is absolute performance. Absolute performance is the “theoretical optimal performance of an athlete,” or performing at 100%. This is often attributed to physiological composition such as height, muscles, weight, lung capacity, etc. and is often mostly influenced by genetics and physical training (Gee).
Obviously not every single athlete performs at 100% every single time they compete. This is where the second term, relative performance, comes in. Relative performance is the day-to-day, or in-competition performance. It is relative because this value is often not 100%, but rather a value proportional relative to the athlete’s absolute performance. An athlete’s relative performance is affected by performance inhibitors which can be either intrinsic or external to the athlete. External inhibitors include things like wind, opponents, and crowd influences. Internal inhibitors can either be physiological or psychological. Physiological inhibitors are things like injury, fatigue, hunger, etc. and psychological inhibitors include things like anxieties and psychological inhibitors deal with the mind (Gee) .
Psychological inhibitors can be broken down further into two categories: cognitive anxieties and somatic anxieties. These types of anxieties refer to the thoughts and physiological responses that arise in a “stressful situation in which the perceived situational demands exceed the individual’s ability to meet those demands and successful performance is important to the individual.” A cognitive anxiety is the doubt, worry, apprehension, and lack of confidence that can surround an athlete in a stressful situation. A somatic anxiety refers to the physiological manifestations such as heavy breathing, disrupted blood flow, tense muscles, impairment of fine motor functioning, and inability to shift attention. All of these things make competing at the highest potential level near impossible (Gee).
In Gee’s next point he explains ways to help treat and control these anxieties by means of sports psychology methods. He introduces methods such as self-talk which inspires confidence to combat cognitive anxieties. Gee also explains that RET is rational emotive therapy which makes the athlete realize that winning is not everything and that the athletes self worth is founded in more than just the results of the competition. This also helps to combat cognitive anxieties. In order to fight off somatic anxieties the author explains methods dealing with relaxation such as deep breathing, centering,, imagery, and meditation (Gee).
Lastly, the author explains the overall benefits of sports psychology. By examining the relative and absolute performance, one is able to realize the difficulties of performing at 100% in competition. There are many factors that inhibit an athlete’s performance and some are inevitable. However, anxieties and psychological inhibitors can be controlled and prevented in order to allow an athlete to perform at the highest level possible in any conditions. In many sports, this is what separates the best from the worst competitors. This is also the reason why the biggest, fastest, strongest athletes are not always the winners in any given competition. This should provide enough proof to coaches and athletes of the actual tangible benefits of sports psychology (Gee).
The author of this article goes a long way to disprove many misconceptions about sports psychology and in the end really demonstrates how this particular type of psychology is extremely beneficial to athletes and coaches. By attempting to clear up common misconceptions about this psychology, Gee advocates for the wider spread usage of sports psychology in many sports. In his eyes, it gives the inferior athlete a chance to compete on every level, and on the flip side, sports psychology gives the superior athlete a chance to gain complete dominance. It has the potential to help all competitors and give athletes and coaches the coveted competitive edge in many sports.
Works Cited
Gee, Chris. “How Does Sports Psychology Actually Improve Athletic Performance? A Framework to Facilitate Athletes’ and Coaches’ Understanding.” Behavior Modification. 386-402. Published September 2010 vol. 34
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